When we learned that Twitter had suspended the New York Post’s account just ahead of the 2020 elections for publishing the Hunter Biden laptop story, replete with possibly damning references to then-candidate Joe Biden, the sense we had been violated deepened when we learned the decision was largely based on Twitter’s fear – wholly uncorroborated at the time – that the story might have been based on Russian misinformation.
It got even worse when it turned out that not only was the Post story true, but the Twitter decision was part of a general media boycott of the information, which could have well swung the election to Donald Trump. Indeed, the media embargo even featured a disingenuous letter signed by 51 former senior U.S. intelligence officials that the story “bore the earmarks of Russian disinformation.”
We were therefore happy to hear that Elon Musk decided to buy Twitter because of the New York Post ban, which he thought was “obviously incredibly inappropriate,” and that he wanted to promote free speech by leveling the playing field.
Not unexpectedly, his announcement did not pass unnoticed. The Right praised him for raising the prospect that their views would no longer be subject to the kind of censorship that the Left imposes on its adversaries when it controls a medium; and the Left was apoplectic at the prospect of losing the political leg-up that Twitter has provided them in public discourse. Theoretically, Twitter can now become a welcoming place for conflicting ideas, where independent picking and choosing can flourish. To be sure, hate speech cannot be allowed to roam freely – but then, who decides what is hate speech, and how? Musk’s claim that he will deny access only to those whose posts violate the law tells us he gets it and will avoid the kind of political judgments implicit in the Post/Hunter Biden episode.
Interestingly, at the same time that the story of Musk’s Twitter plans surfaced, there was a related but disturbing announcement from the Biden administration’s Department of Homeland Security. As described by Politico, there will now be a Disinformation Governance Board run out of the Department of Homeland Security charged with “countering misinformation related to homeland security, focused specifically on irregular migration and Russia.”
In short, there will be an ongoing, systematic, official monitoring of the speech of Americans on the internet. We are not told of any limiting guidelines for determining what is or is not “misinformation,” how far the government can go in investigating the question, nor any limits on governmental efforts to counter any misinformation if it is found to exist.
Scary stuff. We hope that the grownups on the Biden team will think this through and push back.
